Ski jumping and skeleton
2002-02-20, 5:46 p.m.

I'm convinced that most sports at the Winter Olympics were based on a dare. A drunken dare at that.

Can't you just imagination Bob and Sam and some of their other friends out drinking and carousing one night.

Actually, most of these sports probably started in Europe, so it would probably be Sergei and Pierre and their boys out drinking and carousing one night.

And one of them says, "I have a great idea, why don't you ski down this really steep hill and jump off the end." Of course, Sergei probably demurred...not quite drunk enough to do it. But then his druken buddies impugned his manhood and he skied and jumped. Men can be so silly sometimes.

And don't even get me started on skeleton. What would possess a person to hurtle headfirst down an icy, twisty track at 80mph?